A Thimble Full of Hell

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Wednesday, June 24, 2015

To cast this I ran the crucible quite full. With the last aluminium ingot floating in the melt, it was about 8 mm to the top. Of course as this melted, and the rest of the melt got hotter, the crucible ended up pretty much brim full - stuff expands when you heat it up - who knew?. That makes for a touchy time pouring it. Spilling liquid aluminium is probably a bad way to end the evening.

Here is the pattern with the casting, I've cut off the feed gate, and filed down the flashing around the edge.

Friday, May 17, 2013

There was some charcoal in the pour. And I have what looks like bubbling along in patches.

But there's lots of really great detail. I'm moving up to Propane next, less charcoal, less ash.
I think the finger tips may have been ruined by charcoal ash getting into the ceramic mold while I baked it.

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

I started by making a stand for the crucible. That way it stays upright when the charcoal burns. Makes life easier.

I also prepared a bucket of charcoal broken into small lumps, about 2cm on the longest side. They would be easier to load, and burn fast and hot.

I had a lot of fun putting charcoal into the furnace without getting it into the crucible on the Al melts, so I made a sheet metal cone with a handle. I simply covered the crucible and shovelled in the charcoal. Less time with the furnace open.

And I kept it topped up. Once the furnace calmed down from a raging fury, I added more fuel.

It still took a long time to melt the bronze, but the turtle turned out pretty well for my first bronze case, and my second sand cast of anything.

A little tidying up to remove the flashing (I need more practice at making the sand molds) and a little cleaning up with a buffing wheel and this guy's a keeper.